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Post by andydecker on Mar 1, 2020 10:48:29 GMT
The Gods of Pegana I found too primitive and mythological in structure. An apt description. I read it yesterday and it did nothing for me. Very artificial and rather awkward.
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Post by Knygathin on Mar 1, 2020 13:04:18 GMT
... it did nothing for me. Very artificial ... . Yes. I don't think Dunsany was very spiritual, mystical, or religious. And I think he wrote this book from mere hunches, and quickly, not deeply thought through or analyzed. Somewhat lazy work. He drew from his privileged background, the experiences and impressions that gave him. His best quality comes through later, in his poetic dreaming sensibilities, probably best expressed in A Dreamer's Tales. "Idle Days on the Yann", as ropardoe mentioned, and the others. If you admire Lovecraft's early Dunsanian phase, you will likely enjoy these too.
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Post by Knygathin on Mar 1, 2020 13:18:25 GMT
"Idle Days on the Yann", as ropardoe mentioned, and the others. ... "Idle Days on the Yann" has two sequels in Tales of Three Hemisphere. I remember liking those too. ... That was about 30 years ago. Must find time to get back to them soon.
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Post by andydecker on Mar 1, 2020 13:55:02 GMT
... it did nothing for me. Very artificial ... . If you admire Lovecraft's early Dunsanian phase, you will likely enjoy these too. It is a long time I read Lovecrafts early work, couldn't muster any or no enthusiasm for it. But I have to say that the recent interpretion especially of the Dreamworld in Alan Moore's Providence - where he even had a scene of Lovecraft meeting Dunsany at a reading, Providence 8, he reads from Plays of God and Man - gave me a reason to re-read bits and pieces. Stories like The Quest of Iranon still left me cold, though.
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Post by helrunar on Mar 1, 2020 14:23:45 GMT
Hi Andreas,
That scene in Alan Moore's comic book (which I did not much care for--some good moments, but somehow as it went on, I lost interest... I can't even get myself interested enough at this point to analyse why, and I don't think it matters much in any case) where HPL and Dunsany met was based on an actual incident described by Lovecraft in his letters. As shown in the comic, Lovecraft came to Boston to hear Dunsany read. I think it was around 1921. He describes the occasion in several surviving letters--I read whatever Derleth printed in his selection, which has since been superseded by a whole series of editions of the complete letters to various correspondents, exhaustively edited and annotated.
For what it is worth, I think Dunsany's work started off as a kind of extension of the whole Celtic Twilight thing that Yeats and "Fiona Macleod" spearheaded in the late 1890s. I haven't looked at the books we're discussing since I was a teenager--I never read The King of Elfland's Daughter but what a gorgeous work of art Sime created for it.
I was surprised at how good the 1950s story Lady Cynthia printed in her Third Ghost Book was--considerably pared down style compared with what I recall of Dunsany's early work, and it felt as if it was based on an actual experience he had had. I appreciated Rosemary and others sharing other short tales from Plunkett Manor, and hope to read those on my commute this coming week.
Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith, from what I have observed, were fundamentally poetic writers. Both cherished a certain form of musicality in language (Smith gave very specific examples in some of his essays) and the atmosphere evoked by that musicality. The sounds and colors of a book's language were much more important to them than characterization, plot, drama etc. This accounts both for the cult around their work and for the extreme, contemptuous animadversions directed towards it from those who want something more of substance in weird fiction.
H.
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Post by helrunar on Mar 1, 2020 14:31:48 GMT
On a completely different topic, this seems to me a very odd anthology of pieces to be presented to the world as having anything at all to do with the board game of Dungeons & Dragons. Oddly for someone of my vintage, I never played that game, and I struggle with some of the terms people bandy about derived from it--just what the hell is "chaotic good"? I've given up trying to understand.
The stories listed in this selection with which I am familar seem in most instances to have nothing at all to do with the theme and role-playing styles involved in the game. Of course since I have never played the game, maybe I'm completely wrong about that. I just look at the toc and think "was it a slow week when you threw this one together, Mr H?"
A name from the long ago past I have not thought about literally in decades is Upton Sinclair. I read a novel by him as a teenager which was filmed by Disney under the title The Gnome-mobile. I barely remember the book... I think, as is often the case, that it was laced with a very dry vein of wit that failed to make it into the kid-flick.
I suppose it shows just how widely Haining sometimes trawled for these things that he found something by Sinclair to include in this one. I may have to investigate.
H.
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Post by andydecker on Mar 1, 2020 17:19:13 GMT
Hi Andreas, That scene in Alan Moore's comic book (which I did not much care for--some good moments, but somehow as it went on, I lost interest... I can't even get myself interested enough at this point to analyse why, and I don't think it matters much in any case) where HPL and Dunsany met was based on an actual incident described by Lovecraft in his letters.. This becomes rather off topic, but ... Providence is ... difficult. I wanted to write an article about it, but it became obvious fast that it would be too much work just for fun. Also either you spoil every nuance or do not, what would made it even be more difficult. From the standpoint of sheer craft it is a masterwork. One just has to read the annotations to really realize how many details of Lovecraft's work are used, not only put on the page as a quote but often transformed into something new. I also loved the relentless refusal to accomodate reader's expectations. In this it is quite a challenging work. But the rather straightforward plot left me cold. It IS too much of a scavenger hunt. Also to be honest it is virtually inaccessible for readers who don't have a doctor in Lovecraftiana. If you don't know the stories, you can't understand the comic. The question is if a work which you need other sources to understand is at the end not just fanwank. Also I have grown to detest the concept of incorporating HPL as a protagonist. Here it is technically well done, but still. The ending bemoaned by so many as lame and underwhelming has grown on me. It makes 100% sense. And a lot of the interpretions of the original HPL stories done here are much more intelligent and creative then the majority of modern Mythos fiction which still flood the market.
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Post by helrunar on Mar 1, 2020 19:00:06 GMT
I think "fanwank" about sums up Alan Moore's Providence for me. I finally went and read a summary of the final book--after the penultimate volume, and being aghast that that wasn't the actual end--I mean, how much further could he take it? at that point, he was just repetitively layering on more references to the publication history and related events--I just could not bear to buy the final installment and spend time reading it. I was done with it.
According to one blogger whose article I just skimmed, the real subject matter of the series is Moore's repeatedly failed attempts to retire from writing comics and withdraw from the mass marketing feeding frenzy that big-marquee comics have become.
H.
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Post by andydecker on Mar 1, 2020 22:21:12 GMT
I think "fanwank" about sums up Alan Moore's Providence for me. I finally went and read a summary of the final book--after the penultimate volume, and being aghast that that wasn't the actual end--I mean, how much further could he take it? at that point, he was just repetitively layering on more references to the publication history and related events--I just could not bear to buy the final installment and spend time reading it. I was done with it. According to one blogger whose article I just skimmed, the real subject matter of the series is Moore's repeatedly failed attempts to retire from writing comics and withdraw from the mass marketing feeding frenzy that big-marquee comics have become. H. Yes, this was a harsh cut with the last volumes. I am a bit torn about this. I understand the wish to link this with Neonomicon and The Orchard - which were both present from issue 1 thematically - but it was a surprisingly awkward transition. But I thought the end for once a consequent handling of the topics of the Mythos. No heroic last minute rescue, no benevolent gods, just a rewriting of reality. Too Meta? No doubt. But it was nice for once to saw this taken to the logical conclusion. The blogger remark is funny, though. I think it sounds a bit far fetched. The "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in' trope seems a bit strange when it comes to such a complicated project
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Post by Knygathin on Mar 2, 2020 0:35:46 GMT
On a completely different topic, this seems to me a very odd anthology of pieces to be presented to the world as having anything at all to do with the board game of Dungeons & Dragons. Oddly for someone of my vintage, I never played that game, and I struggle with some of the terms people bandy about derived from it--just what the hell is "chaotic good"? I've given up trying to understand. I saw Tales of Dungeons and Dragons in the bookstores when it came out, and remember I reacted negatively, thinking they only were trying to quickly cash in on the game, by simply stamping the trademark name on the cover. Nothing about the book relates to Dungeons & Dragons, except perhaps for a couple or so stories in it. And I questioned why Ray Bradbury would allow his name put on the book; he has no bearing whatsoever on traditional medieval swords & sorcery adventure fantasy, as far as I have seen in his books, his outlook, or way of thinking. I know a bit about the game. "Chaotic good" is someone who is good, as opposed to evil. The person expresses this goodness in a spontaneous, chaotic, or anarchistic way, as opposed to a lawful and orderly way.
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Post by jamesdoig on Mar 6, 2020 20:23:05 GMT
I know a bit about the game. Me too I'm afraid - but it's hard to find a connection with Peter Haining's anthology. Here's a battered set I've got: And on a related note, an unopened Spawn of Cthulhu: Not that I'm still into that sort of thing.
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Post by ropardoe on Mar 7, 2020 9:25:14 GMT
I know a bit about the game. Me too I'm afraid - but it's hard to find a connection with Peter Haining's anthology. Here's a battered set I've got: And on a related note, an unopened Spawn of Cthulhu: Not that I'm still into that sort of thing. Those date back to when Darroll and I used to play it. Brings back memories - it was a lot of fun back then, but we gave it up long before it became popular.
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Post by David A. Riley on Mar 7, 2020 10:05:31 GMT
Me too I'm afraid - but it's hard to find a connection with Peter Haining's anthology. Here's a battered set I've got: And on a related note, an unopened Spawn of Cthulhu: Not that I'm still into that sort of thing. Those date back to when Darroll and I used to play it. Brings back memories - it was a lot of fun back then, but we gave it up long before it became popular. I have the little Cthulhu figure, all painted up for me by my daughter Cassandra when she was about ten or eleven and briefly into fantasy wargaming. It sits on a shelf here now.
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Post by helrunar on Mar 9, 2020 3:42:00 GMT
Spawn of Cthulhu, hand painted by your daughter... that is really quite sweet and precious.
cheers, H.
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Post by dem bones on Mar 31, 2020 8:41:27 GMT
"The pestilence kept people much within doors, and the streets were more solitary than was customary."
Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu - Borrhomeo the Astrologer: (Dublin University Magazine, Jan. 1862). Milan, 1630. Borrhomeo, seer, alchemist and watcher of the stars, inadvertently summons a fiend in the form of a young man in mourning suit, who solemnly warns him to quit his twin pursuit of gold and the elixir vitae. Happily for us, Borrhomeo won't listen, and instead begs the stranger to introduce him to his master. The trap is sprung! No sooner has the alchemist exchanged his soul for immortality than he has cause to repent. Terrific tale of magic, torture and woe, briefly features a dungeon, too, though, mercifully, no dragon.
William Faulkner - The Kid Learns: (New Orleans Picayane, May 31 1925). Aspiring mobster Johnny regrets playing the gallant.
F. Anstey - Three Wishes: (Windsor, March 1912). Two glum pre-teens are spending the Christmas vacation at Witherington High School on the South Coast. Heyward Brevoort, who is fascinated by all things Arabian Nights, fortuitously summons a Djinn while rubbing on an Indian ring and demands his requisite three wishes. Being a good egg, he offers English chum Jack Ainsley the first of them. Jack requests a spiffing tricycle just like Gowers'. Next morning, a large parcel arrives for him .... whereupon things seemingly take a turn for the sinister. Or could it be that mischievous Colonel Kavenagh and his manservant know more than they are letting on?
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